


Hugs for Heroes

by EllieRose101



Series: Spuffy vs. 2020 [2]
Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV)
Genre: F/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-05
Updated: 2020-06-05
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:27:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24562351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EllieRose101/pseuds/EllieRose101
Summary: Tenderness in a time of chaos.
Relationships: Spike/Buffy Summers
Series: Spuffy vs. 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1775368
Kudos: 18





	Hugs for Heroes

**Author's Note:**

> This fic addresses, in some small way, the current political situation in the US. I have approached the topic as sensitively as I’m able and hope the intention to foster healing comes across in the text as well as I’ve intended it.
> 
> The situation follows loosely on from the pandemic fic I posted a few weeks ago. You can read this without reading that, but they do work best together.

One Shot

Spike woke up in bed alone. He could smell Buffy’s scent on her pillow, and feel the residual warmth of her body on her side of the sheets, so knew she hadn’t been gone long. Still, the absence pulled at him.

Slowly blinking sleep-heavy eyes, he automatically raised a hand to his head and felt a small smile tug at his lips. It had been years, but he still wasn’t used to the mass of loose curls Buffy had insisted he let “be free” (a command that apparently applied to both bleach and hair gel).

He swung his legs out of bed and took a brief moment to look down at them, wrapped in a pair of sweatpants as they were: a more recent change Buffy had wanted, though less adamantly than the hair.

“What if there’s an emergency in the middle of the night?” she’d reasoned.

“Any demon breaking in isn’t gonna care about my dangly bits,” he’d countered.

But then she said, “I was actually thinking about when the baby comes. If we need to leave in a hurry, all the seconds we can save on the way to the hospital will definitely be of the good.”

And he could have argued with that, given that she pointedly hadn’t requested he wear a shirt and the logic of bottoms should also have applied to a hypothetical top, but, well… humoring Buffy was something he took pleasure in, these days. Slayer wasn’t daft. She knew the three seconds it would take to put on bottoms was negligible, but if it made her feel better, he’d do it. He’d wear a sodding tutu if she really wanted it, though he hadn’t explicitly said that either. Best not to give her ideas.

Spike padded out of the bedroom on bare feet, finding Buffy on the sofa in the adjoining room, sat in front of a muted telly, remote still in hand. He saw the tracks down her cheeks at the same moment he smelt the distinct tang of tears on the air and his heart crumbled.

“Couldn’t sleep?” he asked, purposefully keeping his tone soft. Neutral.

She shook her head slightly. “Heartburn.”

“Ah.” He bobbed his head despite the fact she wasn’t looking at him. “Want some milk?”

Buffy pointed to a half-empty glass on the coffee table. “I’m good,” she said, then turned more to face his position in the doorway and lifted a hand. “Come join me?”

Spike took her offered hand and raised it to his lips, gently pressing a kiss to the palm before taking up the rest of the invitation and installing himself beside Buffy on the couch.

She curled against him as much as the bump would allow and sighed happily when he kissed her forehead. He cast his eyes at the screen flickering over the top of her head before asking his second redundant question of the night.

“More trouble?”

Buffy sniffled and tilted her head to watch with him. “It’s so awful. All that fighting, and I can’t do anything.”

“Not this time,” said Spike, “but you do your bit.”

She frowned, clearly unappeased. “It’s not enough.”

“I know, pet.” He stroked the hair out of her eyes and delicately massaged the tears into her cheeks with his thumbs.

“It’s wrong,” said Buffy.

“Won’t find any argument here,” said Spike. “Cops have a lot to answer for. No excuse for it.”

“I just feel so… so helpless,” said Buffy. “I’m supposed to fight evil, and there it is.” She pointed at the television. “Right there! And I’m here.” She looked down at her stomach and huffed a frustrated breath, stroking a hand over the bump before looking back up at Spike. “I’m not sorry I’m here, I just….” Buffy took the sequence of movements full circle and looked back at the screen. “It’s wrong,” she said again.

“Human evil,” said Spike, “Not your remit.”

Buffy glared at him, fresh tears welling in her eyes. “Maybe not as a Slayer, but I’m human, too. That makes me part of this. God!” She shook her head and looked down at herself again, in a much quieter voice adding, “I messed up. Lots of times I didn’t even think about until recently. Jokes I made about the first slayer’s hair, or– or assumptions about Principal Wood, or–” She shook her head again. “I can’t even think of the rest right now, but they’ve been coming back to me. I’m not innocent.”

“None of us are innocent,” said Spike. “I know that more than most.”

“That doesn’t excuse–” Buffy began to protest, but he raised a hand.

“I know, all right? Not sayin’ it does.”

She frowned again, the rest of her tirade forgotten. “What _are_ you saying?”

Spike considered his answer carefully. “Reckon I know a little about redemption,” he said after a minute. “Not so sure it can be earned. Can’t blot out a sin once it’s been done, yeah? But the trying… I reckon the trying matters.”

“And if it’s not enough?” asked Buffy, her voice small.

“It’s never enough,” he told her honestly, “but beating ourselves up doesn’t do much of anyone good. Actions are what matter, yeah?”

“Yeah,” said Buffy, absently rubbing her belly again.

“So we’ll donate,” continued Spike. “Go to any marches there are just as soon as you’re not laid up. Though I bloody well hope it’ll all be resolved long before that. You’d be good at teachin’ bullies what it’s like to feel intimidated.”

“What else?” asked Buffy softly, sleep clearly starting to tug at her.

Spike settled her against his bare chest and linked his fingers with hers on top of her belly. “We teach the next generation to be better.”

**Author's Note:**

> If you have been moved by this fic and the events it represents, I humbly suggest you donate, as I have done, to The NAACP.


End file.
